Totally "Lost": Weekend wonderings...

May 8, 2010 - Ray Eckenrode

We think it’s been pretty well established (and maybe it’s just the nature of storytelling, in general) that the creators of “Lost” are better at creating questions than providing answers. So as we head down the homestretch (now four and a half hours) of the greatest serial mystery television has ever seen, here are four questions we’d like answered:

Who are Jacob and the Man in Black? We don’t even think WHAT they are is that relevant anymore. As it’s become more and more obvious that the island timeline is a giant circle, it’s become more and more intriguing to us that they could actually have some direct connection to the Losties.

Who or what is David Shephard? As the season has gone on, it seems that young Mr. Shephard is the only character who exists in the sideways reality but not in the island timeline? What’s up with that? That’s a pretty big clue, right? If we return to our theory that the sideways reality is “manufactured” by someone that might lead us to ask: Was the sideways manufactured specifically to create David Shephard?

Where in the wide world is Christian Shephard? In the island timeline, we’ve got an empty coffin and a bunch of ghost sighting (at least some of which can be linked to Smokey) but no body. In the sideways world, Christian’s body was not on Flight 815 and is supposedly en route to L.A. now for his burial. But when that casket arrives, who exactly will be in it?

Why are Claire and Aaron so important? Claire was lured onto Flight 815, captured and prodded by The Others, protected by Locke, possibly claimed after dying in an explosion and has been “guarded” by the Man In Black for three years now (he was very careful to keep her off that submarine). Why? Certainly, you could theorize that part of it had to do with Aaron’s birth, but why now? You know our thoughts on Aaron, we think there was a very big hint in the pilot that he was claimed before he was ever born. But why? By who? For what?